1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a control apparatus of a vehicle, for stopping an unable-to-drive vehicle at an appropriate position, the unable-to-drive vehicle being a vehicle of which the driver has become an unable-to-drive state where the driver is unable to drive the vehicle, due to, for example, a heart attack or a cerebral infarction.
2. Description of the Related Art
Japanese patent laid-open publication No. 2010-125923 discloses a vehicle control apparatus for stopping a vehicle at an appropriate position when the driver has become the unable-to-drive state. According to this apparatus, the stop position of the vehicle is decided according to the road configuration when the driver has become unable to drive the vehicle, automatic driving of the vehicle is performed to the decided position, and the vehicle is stopped at the position. For example, when the vehicle runs on a left-curved one-lane road with no opposite lane, the control of stopping the vehicle on the right side of the road, which hardly becomes a blind spot, is performed.
According to the above conventional apparatus, it is possible to stop the vehicle at an appropriate position when the driver has become the unable-to-drive state. However, for promptly performing the life saving activity for the driver, it is not sufficient to simply stop the vehicle.